The present invention relates to ablation instruments for the ablation of tissue for the treatment of diseases, and, in particular, to percutaneous instruments employing radiant energy. Methods of ablating tissue using radiant energy are also disclosed. The instruments can be used, for example, in the treatment of cardiac conditions such as cardiac arrhythmias.
Cardiac arrhythmias, e.g., fibrillation, are irregularities in the normal beating pattern of the heart and can originate in either the atria or the ventricles. For example, atrial fibrillation is a form of arrhythmia characterized by rapid randomized contractions of atrial myocardium, causing an irregular, often rapid ventricular rate. The regular pumping function of the atria is replaced by a disorganized, ineffective quivering as a result of chaotic conduction of electrical signals through the upper chambers of the heart. Atrial fibrillation is often associated with other forms of cardiovascular disease, including congestive heart failure, rheumatic heart disease, coronary artery disease, left ventricular hypertrophy, cardiomyopathy, or hypertension.
Various techniques have been proposed for the treatment of arrhythmia. Although these procedures were originally performed with a scalpel, various other techniques have also been developed to form lesions. Collectively, these treatments are referred to as “ablation.” In non-surgical ablations, the tissue is treated, generally with heat or cold, to cause coagulation and/or tissue necrosis (i.e., cell destruction). In each of these techniques, cardiac muscle cells are replaced with scar tissue which cannot conduct normal electrical activity within the heart.
For example, the pulmonary vein has been identified as one of the origins of errant electrical signals responsible for triggering atrial fibrillation. In one known approach, circumferential ablation of tissue within the pulmonary veins or at the ostia of such veins has been practiced to treat atrial fibrillation. Similarly, ablation of the region surrounding the pulmonary veins as a group has also been proposed. By ablating the heart tissue (typically in the form of linear or curved lesions) at selected locations, electrical conductivity from one segment to another can be blocked and the resulting segments become too small to sustain the fibrillatory process on their own.
Several types of ablation devices have recently been proposed for creating lesions to treat cardiac arrhythmias, including devices which employ electrical current (e.g., radio-frequency “RF”) heating or cryogenic cooling. Such ablation devices have been proposed to create elongated lesions that extend through a sufficient thickness of the myocardium to block electrical conduction. Many of the recently proposed ablation instruments are percutaneous devices that are designed to create such lesions from within the heart. Such devices are positioned in the heart by catheterization of the patient, e.g., by passing the ablation instrument into the heart via a blood vessel, such as the femoral vein.
Devices that rely upon resistive or conductive heat transfer can be prone to serious post-operative complications. In order to quickly perform an ablation with such “contact” devices, a significant amount of energy must be applied directly to the target tissue site. In order to achieve transmural penetration, the surface that is contacted will experience a greater degree of heating (or freezing). For example, in RF heating of the heart wall, a transmural lesion requires that the tissue temperature be raised to about 50° C. throughout the thickness of the wall. To achieve this, the temperature at the contact surface will typically be raised to greater than 100° C. In this temperature regime, there is a substantial risk of tissue destruction (e.g., due to water vaporization micro-explosions or due to carbonization). Charring of the surface of the heart tissue, in particular, can lead to the creation of blood clots on the surface and post-operative complications, including stroke. Even if structural damage is avoided, the extent of the lesion (i.e., the width of the ablated zone) on the surface that has been contacted will typically be greater than necessary.
Ablation devices that do not require direct contact have also been proposed, including acoustic and radiant energy. Acoustic energy (e.g., ultrasound) is poorly transmitted into tissue (unless a coupling fluid is interposed). Laser energy has also been proposed but only in the context of devices that focus light into a scalpel-like point or similar high intensity spot pattern. When the light energy is delivered in the form of a focused spot, the process is inherently time consuming because of the need to expose numerous spots to form a continuous linear or curved lesion.
In addition, existing instruments for cardiac ablation also suffer from a variety of design limitations. The shape of the heart muscle adds to the difficulty in accessing cardiac structures, such as the pulmonary veins on the anterior surface of the heart. Typically, percutaneous devices are positioned with the assistance of a guide wire, which is first advanced into heart. In one common approach, described, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 6,012,457 issued to Lesh on Jan. 11, 2000 and in International Application Pub. No. WO 00/67656 assigned to Atrionix, Inc., a guide wire or similar guide device is advanced through the left atrium of the heart and into a pulmonary vein. A catheter instrument with an expandable element is then advanced over the guide and into the pulmonary vein where the expandable element (e.g., a balloon) is inflated. The balloon structure also includes a circumferential ablation element, e.g., an RF electrode carried on the outer surface of the balloon, which performs the ablation procedure. The balloon must be large enough and sufficiently rigid to hold the electrode in contact with the inner surface of the pulmonary vein for the length of the procedure. Moreover, because the lesion is formed by an ablation element carried on the surface of the balloon element, the balloon shape inherently limits the locations where a lesion can be formed, i.e., the lesion must be formed at least partially within the pulmonary vein.
In another approach described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,235,025 issued to Swartz et al. on May 22, 2001, a guide wire is again used to percutaneously access a pulmonary vein and a catheter is again slid over the guide to a position within the pulmonary vein. The catheter device includes two spaced-apart balloons, which are inflated in the vein (or in the vein and at its mouth). The space between the two balloons can then be filled with a conductive fluid to delivery RF energy (or, alternatively, ultrasound) to the vein and thereby induce a conduction block in the blood vessel by tissue ablation. With the Swartz et al. device, like the Lesh device, the region where tissue ablation can occur is limited by the design. Because two balloons must seal a space that is then filled with an ablative fluid, the lesion is necessarily formed within the pulmonary vein.
Ablation within the pulmonary vein can result in complications. Overtreatment deep within a vein can result in stenosis (closure of the vein itself), necrosis or other structural damage, any of which can necessitate immediate open chest surgery.
A major limitation in the prior art percutaneous designs is the lack of site selectability. Practically speaking, each prior art percutaneous instrument is inherently limited by its design to forming an ablative lesion at one and only one location. For example, when an expandable balloon carrying an RF heating device on its surface is deployed at the mouth of a vein, the lesion can only be formed at a location defined by the geometry of the device. It is not possible to form the lesion at another location because the heating element must contact the target tissue. Similarly, the above-described tandem balloon device can only form a lesion at a location defined by the space between the balloons that is filled with the ablative fluid.
Another major limitation in prior art percutaneous designs is their inability to accommodate the actual and quite varied geometry of the heart. The inner surface of the atrium is not regular. In particular, the mouths of the pulmonary veins do not exhibit regularity; they often bear little resemblance to conical or funnel-shaped openings. When the expandable, contact heating devices of the prior art encounter irregularly-shaped ostia, the result can be an incompletely formed (non-circumferential) lesion.
Accordingly, a percutaneous ablation device that allows the clinician to select the location of the ablation site would be highly desirable. An instrument that allows a clinician to choose from a number of different lesion locations, especially in creating continuous conduction blocks around pulmonary veins, would satisfy a long felt need in the art.
Moreover, the prior art devices typically can not determine whether continuous circumferential contact has been achieved before heating commences. These devices most often rely on post-ablation electrical mapping to determine whether a circumferential lesion has been formed. If electrical conduction is still present, the encircling lesion is incomplete and the procedure must be repeated or abandoned.
Accordingly, there also exists a need for better surgical ablation instruments that can form lesions with less trauma to the healthy tissue of the heart and greater likelihood of success. A percutaneous system that could determine whether contact has been achieved (or blood has been cleared from the target site) and predict success based on such determinations would represent a significant improvement over the existing designs.